A new report claims that both the Nokia 7.1 and the Nokia 7.1 Plus will be powered by the Snapdragon 710 chipset. This report validates previous leaks that claimed that HMD Global is working on a Snapdragon 710-equipped mid-range device. These reports first emerged last June, with industry insider Roland Quandt further stating that the HMD Global will launch the product in the fourth quarter of 2018.
By equipping the two devices with the Snapdragon 710 chipset, users should expect better performance compared to the Nokia 7 and the Nokia 7 Plus, which sported the Snapdragon 630 and the Snapdragon 660 SoCs respectively. The Snapdragon 710 chipset is comprised of an octa-core CPU, which has six efficiency cores running at a maximum clock speed of 1.7GHz and two high-performance cores clocked at up to 2.2GHz. Qualcomm previously claimed that the Snapdragon 710 chipset offers up to 20-percent over-all performance uplift as well as improved app launching and web browsing speeds compared to the Snapdragon 660. The Snapdragon 710 chipset also offers improvements in power consumption and graphical performance, as well as twice the artificial intelligence computational capabilities compared to the Snapdragon 660.
Previous reports already detailed the design and features of the Nokia 7.1 and the Nokia 7.1 Plus. The two devices will reportedly feature Zeiss-branded dual rear cameras, and in the Nokia 7.1 Plus, users may find the LED flash and the rear fingerprint scanner directly below the imaging modules. Recent reports also state that the Nokia 7.1 Plus will feature a larger display compared to the Nokia 7.1. Furthermore, the Nokia 7.1 Plus will have a notch above the display and it will likely contain the earpiece and the single front-facing camera, according to recent leaks. The Nokia 7.1 Plus will reportedly include 6GB of RAM and 128GB of internal flash storage, and while there is limited information about its specifications, recent reports state that the Nokia 7.1 will feature similar hardware specifications with the larger handset. It is likely that both devices will be a part of the Android One program, which means that the two handsets will receive security patches and software updates faster compared to rival smartphones, and that the two devices will ship with Android 9 Pie pre-installed.